Like Oedipus seeking to investigate those who brought a curse upon Thebes, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius has asked her department’s inspector general to look into the problems that have plagued the rollout of the federal healthcare.gov website.

The decision is a classic Washington self-protection maneuver. With calls mounting for President Obama to fire Sebelius over the botched rollout of his health care law, the move is an attempt to keep critics at bay by deflecting questions with a boilerplate statement that she is awaiting the results of an internal review.